The scientific literature is one of humanity’s greatest creations – a complete record of the ideas, experiments and discoveries of generations of researchers across the globe. While most of this corpus is now online, it remains as inaccessible to the public as it was centuries ago – with the physical limitations of print journals replaced by expensive publisher pay walls. Eisen, a leader in the movement to reinvent scientific communication, will discuss the origins of this absurd system, why it still exists, how the “open access” movement he helped to launch is finally bringing it to an end.

Commonwealth Club

The leading national forum open to all for the impartial discussion of public issues important to the membership, community and nation. The Commonwealth Club of California is the nation's oldest and largest public affairs forum. Each year, we bring nearly 500 events on topics ranging across politics, culture, society and the economy to more than 25,000 members and the public, both in-person and via an extensive online and on-air listenership and viewership.